Month: December 2017

There are a lot of question raised about the integrity of the counting process in the recently held elections in Honduras. Of the 99.98% votes counted, the current president Juan Orlando Hernández garnered about 42.98% and led the one-round poll against Salvador Nasralla who got 41.38%. Even though Mr. Hernández was declared the winner, the opposition believes that there was systematic fraud in the counting process.
This doubt raised by the opposition has thrown the country into a state of emergency with the President declaring a ten-day curfew from 10 AM to 6 PM on the 1st of December. Mr. Nasrallah’s supporters, however, did not care about the lockout and broke it. There have been violent protests and looting with several people killed and many injured, though the reports are not verified.

Many analysts have analyzed the results of the election to find out if the election was rigged. But most of the analysts believe that it is still inconclusive, but there are many areas where there is a cause for concern. After the polls ended, the TSE released that Mr. Nasralla was leading by 5% points, but suddenly it then suspended publication of results. After the counting resumed, the lead narrowed, and Mr. Hernandez had an unbeaten lead of 1.6 percentage points.

One of the primary reasons for the integrity issue to crop up is due to the video that came up where Mr. Hernandez party leader was found giving tips on fraud techniques in a training session conducted for poll workers. The opposition claims that 43% of the votes released after the interruption by TSE was doctored, but have been unable to prove their claim.

TSE may soon decide on the re-election of Mr. Hernandez, and the opposition has a few days left to appeal for a recount of the tally sheets. Meanwhile, the country’s future is on the backburner for the moment.

The year 2017 has ended, and so has the season for sports. There were some historic wins, inspiring stories, huge scandals, some stars rising in glory, some fading away to oblivion and many more. Here are a few stories that made headlines in 2017.

Winning and losing streaks: The Cleveland Indians created history by not losing a match for three weeks and 22 games. That makes it the longest winning streak without a tie in the history of baseball and only the second longest unbeaten record in sports behind the 26 game record of the New York Giants.
It was a sad year for the UConn women’s basketball team as they saw their winning streak come to an end after staying lossless for many years. They ended a 111 game winning run that started from the month of Nov 2014 and is the most for a team in Division 1 basketball. But the coach was not too disheartened after the loss.

Trouble in NFL: President Trump recently used an expletive to explain about the players who refused to sing the national anthem. That has turned out to be the sports story of the year. The comment made by Trump was not well received by the players as well as the whole nation. While Trump has not stopped blasting NFL on Twitter, sponsors say that the reason for the protest is due to low profit. Meanwhile to make matters worse for NFL, Colin Kaepernick has filed a collusion grievance against NFL owners.

NBA offseason stories: Every year stars are traded, but 2017 has seen an unprecedented number of stars finding new homes and that too not without some melodrama. Chris Paul followed James Harden to Houston, Paul George and Carmelo Anthony went to Oklahoma City. Minnesota got Jimmy Butler. Gordon Hayward after much hype chose Boston Celtics, and they then grabbed Kyrie Irving in a deal with the arch-rivals Cleveland Cavaliers. The reason for the request is the talk of the town, and as per inside sources, it was to escape from LeBron James. But Irving chooses not to reveal the reason for such a request.

The Ball family: This family is in the news for all kinds of reasons. The first son Lono was crowned as the UCLA college basketball star in his only season and was listed as a No2 player by the Los Angeles Lakers. His brother, Angelo, also enrolled at UCLA but was arrested for a shoplifting case in China. He signed a contract with a team in Lithuania. The youngest in the Ball family, LaMelo is also joining his brother in Lithuania. The father, LaVar claimed that he could beat Michael Jordan. He also demanded that one of the female referees be replaced in an AAU game. He also recently tweeted against Donald Trump getting all the attention from Americans.

Serena still rules: She played only two events in 2017, but she will remain an inspiration for all, both on and off the field. She won her 23rd Single’s Grand title by beating her sister Venus in the Australian Open and became the first to have so many grand slam titles. In April, she revealed in a tournament about her pregnancy and will give birth anytime now. Post delivery, she is scheduled to start playing in a match in Abu Dhabi.